


Pyrophobia

by Carry_on_Wayward_Daughter



Category: Critical Role
Genre: Campaign 2 (Critical Role), Episode 56, critical role - Freeform, the mighty nein - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-24
Updated: 2019-03-24
Packaged: 2019-11-29 10:55:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18222194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Carry_on_Wayward_Daughter/pseuds/Carry_on_Wayward_Daughter





	Pyrophobia

Her heart is in her throat and she wants so badly to cry. 

She begged for Fjord to say something, anything, trusting in his ability to talk his way out of any situation, but in that moment, he was silent, eyes wide in shock and fear. Nott is begging for them to listen, to just give her her husband, to let them go, Caduceus is on the ground, and oh, Traveller, please, he’s still so weak, not himself. Beau is still, and that bothers her, her friend normally a whirlwind her eyes can barely follow. Yasha is quiet, uncertain, but Caleb–

Caleb steps forward, and she doesn’t remember what he says, but gods, there’s a desperation in his voice that  _demands_  he be paid attention. The Bright Queen looks to him and gives her consent.

“Jester, I’m coming over to you.”

And he walks towards her, hands raised, and it takes everything within her to remain where she stands.

Less than a day ago, he raised his hands, and the warmth and fire that she had come to associate with Caleb’s protection had been turned against her and nearly incinerated them all, and though she knows it wasn’t him, wasn’t his fault, she’s afraid.

They are so far from home, so far from Nicodranas, from the Chateau, from her mama, and she’s so, so scared. 

She meets Caleb’s eyes, her own prickling with tears, and she chokes back a sob, afraid to make any noise whatsoever. 

What is he doing? What is his plan?They are never going home, they’re surrounded, what is going to happen to them?

“I am just going to open the bag.”

She knows he is speaking to the Queen, the court, the guards, but he looks her dead in the eyes, and she knows that he’s also speaking to her. She nods and takes the haversack from her shoulders and turns it towards him slowly. 

Fear shakes her when the guards all bead their weapons on the two of them, suspicious and mistrusting and she freezes. She wants so badly to close her eyes, to squeeze them shut tight and never open them again until her mama comes into her room to rouse her from her sleep and take her to draw and play and sing.

But Caleb is steady, steadier than she’s ever seen him before, his hands sure and deft as he reaches into the bag, nails blackened and charred with soot and ash from the day before, his crystalline scars peeking out from under his sleeves.

“I say this,” he says as he pulls out his intended treasure, “as a child of the Empire. I am of the Empire, but I am no friend  _to_  the empire.”

And he raises the dodecahedron high into the air.

Caleb, her friend, steps forward and places the Beacon down at the feet of the Queen, and she knows that Brenn, whoever he had been before he was Caleb, isn’t here, not the way he had been in the well, because Brenn was a child of the Empire. Brenn was loyal to the empire, a roaring flame meant to burn everything in sight that threatened King Dwendal’s domain.

Brenn was Caleb, but Caleb was not Brenn.

That much is clear in his willingness to set the Beacon down, to ensure their lives, and the fire that burns within him isn’t a destructive weapon, she remembers, but a shining light, meant to warm and protect them.

Brenn was Caleb.

Caleb is _not_ Brenn.

And Caleb Widowgast is her friend.


End file.
